


In a Manner of Speaking...

by TheSoupDragon



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: ...so to speak..., ...with swear words..., Definite Johnlock...but sort of left to your own imagination, Extreme Swearing, First time...but also left to your own imagination once I’ve fired it up, Friends to lovers..., Fruity language, John has a surprising kink, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Sherlock also has a kink but (really?! Come on!) that won’t surprise anyone…, Swearing, lots of swearing, or maybe you will not be so surprised…
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-03-29
Packaged: 2019-04-14 12:03:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14135670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSoupDragon/pseuds/TheSoupDragon
Summary: He felt that he must be a bit red in the face and he swallowed with some difficulty.Of course Sherlock noticed John's odd reaction. He looked at him sharply. “What?" he said crossly."Er–nothing. Nothing. N–er, nothing at all."“What's the matter? Is it what he said about…” Sherlock gestured delicately between them both with his hand as he spoke, “…what he said about...you and I?"“No! Er, no…No. Oh God, that's–that's nothing. I'm–er, I'm used to that.""What, then?""I–I just...erm..."John found it hard to lie on the spot. And particularly hard to lie to Sherlock, to whom lying was totally pointless.Sherlock doesn't swear. Ever.But what would happen if one day he did?





	In a Manner of Speaking...

**Author's Note:**

> Massive thanks are due again to [StarsAndStitches](http://archiveofourown.org/users/StarsAndStitches/pseuds/StarsAndStitches), for her unending enthusiasm and thoughtful and considered beta-reading...Not to mention her support, appreciation and total understanding of my somewhat warped and subversive sense of humour. 
> 
> Please note the warning tags - I've only rated this mature because of the language: It contains swearing. Quite a lot of it, actually. I think, really, that this is just a bit of filthy-word-porn that I wrote one day on a whim (long, _long_ before Series 4, where things are said and words are paced out on CCTV cameras), and even though I wrote it, I still think, 'Yeah, but Sherlock really _wouldn't_ say that, would he?’ and 'John really wouldn't say _that_ either,' and I know it's a bit OOC on both their parts, but I just couldn't help it. You know the drill; sorry, not-at-all sorry, yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s how fic happens, baby - but it just came to me one day and the whole idea of it really made me smile to myself. I _had_ to write it. I also laughed quite a lot _while_ I was writing it, and I know, I’m sorry - insert a ‘modest, much?’ emoticon here - but if this story gives you that same brief moment of joy and amusement in your day too, then that would make me very happy indeed! :)
> 
> (NB: Hmmm! I hadn't thought of this before, but while doing a late proof-read, this thought suddenly struck me: If you read my “21 words” and maybe liked it, then this is almost an x-rated version of that story…well, it’s _not_ \- not quite - but if you read them both one after the other, you’ll see what I mean. One’s sweet and fluffy and lovey and cuddly and one’s, well… _not!)_
> 
> Oh, and one other thing, just so you know; the word “fags” can (and still does, in the U.K.) mean “cigarettes.” Ok?! ;} You definitely need to remember that!

For once, just John had a case; a unusual case all by himself. Unfortunately though, it was a case of writer’s block. Usually, the writing up of their most recent case for the blog was almost an easy pleasure, a form of mindful therapy in choosing the right words and expressing himself. With his dictionary, thesaurus and google by his side, and making sure to add a bit of humour or drama where necessary to make it more interesting, the writing usually came easily - and if it didn't, he would wait a while and come back to it when he'd had a bit of a think, and then it would - but writing up this case was proving annoyingly difficult. He read back through the last few sentences he’d written and then deleted them in disgust. What really wasn’t helping his state of mind much either was that he was still really pissed off about what had happened earlier that morning.

 

What had happened earlier that morning was that John had woken abruptly at 6.02 a.m., to the stench of something obnoxious burning downstairs and had pounded down the staircase in just his pants and skidded into the kitchen; heart in his mouth that something had caught fire…but when he spun round the kitchen doorway and realised the full extent of the situation, his heart dropped safely back down again and he just thought in total resignation, _Oh no, of course not, silly me, I just live with Sherlock._ That explained a lot of things, a lot of the time. Nothing had caught fire, but apparently Sherlock had put something into the microwave and inexplicably cremated it. _’But why would you do that?’_ a normal person might quite reasonably be inclined to ask. But life at Baker Street was never what you’d call ‘normal’; things generally weren't ever _that_ simple in this place, and so you didn't ask _’But why would you do that?’_ , you just asked _’Do you really have to do that_ now?!’  
“What the— _what are you doing?”_ John almost yelled from the doorway, still catching his breath, adrenaline pumping, as Sherlock stood ineffectively waving the folded newspaper at the smoke alarm, pre-empting its pending decision to possibly start alarming, but half-heartedly, knowing it only would if it thought it really needed to. And ok, there wasn't really that much actual smoke for it to get upset about anyway, true, but the stench was indescribable. Sherlock did not so much as bat an eyelid at John’s chaotic appearance. “Just conducting an experiment on how high temperatures affect the cornea,” he supplied breezily. “Been thinking about the effects of exposure to extreme heat on the human body. However, I do think I may have slightly overdone the temperature/length of heat exposure ratio.” He swirled over to the microwave.  
“Cornea?” echoed John, comprehension dawning horribly as Sherlock crossed the room. “Wait, those eyes that you had in the fridge yesterday, you mean you’ve put them in the—”  
Sherlock opened the microwave door cautiously and a puff of acrid white smoke belched delicately out. They both jerked backwards automatically. Then John launched himself at the kitchen window to open it, releasing a string of expletives as he did so, most of them aimed in Sherlock’s general direction, concerning the general inappropriateness of the hour to be conducting such experiments, the unpleasant fragrance, the reasoning, validity and, indeed, the necessity of conducting such experiments anyway and querying the real need for them to be performed in their kitchen at all. When he turned around from opening the window and saw exactly what Sherlock was retrieving gingerly from the microwave - at arm’s length with the aid of the oven glove - he hit the roof. _“Oh, for fu_ —you’ve _actually_ used one of _my_ cups to fry _SOME SODDING EYES!?”_ he roared. “As if we aren't short enough of decent bloody cups anyway that you have to use _one of mine?”_

The unfortunate cup was one from a set of four that Jeanette, the teacher girlfriend, had given him. They were simply designed, plain white coffee cups, each bearing a single printed word in neat, black, typewritten lettering. John quite liked these cups, they were a nice shape and comfortable to hold. Two of them happened to have the words _‘his’_ and _‘hers’_ printed on them. “We don't use this one anyway,” replied Sherlock, peering carefully into it from a distance, and avoiding breathing in the faint wisps of white smoke still rising from it. It was the cup labelled _‘hers’._  
“ _Jesus!_ So maybe we don’t, but that’s still no reason to use it for recklessly incinerating human remains at six o’fucking clock in the morning!” snapped John.  
Sherlock looked at him sharply. “Why do you want to be reminded of that awful boring woman? She ended the relationship with you, didn't she?”  
She certainly had. And the reason for it stood right in front of John, holding a cup that she had bought him with some freshly cooked human eyes in it, still gently smoking.  
“Why couldn’t you use one of your glass things?” John barked back, outraged. “You've got enough bloody chemistry sets to—”  
“— _Chemistry sets?”_ interrupted Sherlock frostily, in a voice of pure scathing sarcasm. _“Chemistry sets?”_ he hissed loudly in disgust.  
But John was furious and didn't care. _“Don’t_ do this again! _Don’t_ use my stuff for your experiments and _don’t touch my cups!”_ he yelled.  
Sherlock stared at John and put the offending cup down on the table carefully and deliberately, still staring at John coldly. He turned the cup around so the word _‘hers'_ faced John. _“I won’t,”_ he said icily, and he popped the ’t’ of ‘won’t’ in the same way that he popped the ’p’ of ‘nope’. Then he turned and glided smoothly out of the kitchen, silky dressing gown billowing dramatically. He didn't slam any doors but it was just as dramatic an exit. _A great start to the weekend,_ thought John, looking at his blackened cup. Sherlock was right, no one had touched that cup since Jeanette had dumped him and left the other month, but it still didn't mean it was ok to fry some eyes in it at stupid o’clock on a Saturday morning. He touched it tentatively to see if it was cool enough to handle, and then, without looking at the contents too closely, he dropped it directly into the bin and went back to bed. 

 

~~~~~~

 

A few hours later, he had sat down again at his laptop to try and finish writing up the blog. He really wasn’t enjoying this one. This case was being so reluctant to write up for some reason. Even though he’d already gone away and come back to it several times over the last few days, it still just wouldn't come together. Reading it through, it seemed almost quite dull and yet, it really shouldn't be; it was a truly tabloid-sensational case of in-family blackmail, and it contained embezzlement and intrigue and fraud and it had a very unlikable perpetrator. But John found his writing on this one just wouldn't flow - what with all the financial jargon and legal issues…as he read it back, the blog just sounded like a problem page from the Financial Times, and the perpetrator just sounded suspiciously like some kind of dubious, made-up pantomime villain. It was annoying. He and Sherlock hadn't spoken a single word since the cup argument that morning, but really, he had been feeling strained and a bit pissed off before that anyway. They hadn’t been getting on very well lately. The atmosphere in the flat hadn't been all that great for quite a while. At the moment you could cut it with a spoon. 

John stared dejectedly at the screen, chin resting on one hand, and with the other hand he drummed his fingers on the table. Then he leaned back in his chair and gave in and asked Sherlock, who was sitting silently reading at the table opposite him, "What did he say, you know, when you confronted him? At the end?"  
Sherlock looked up from the obituary page of The Times. “What?" he snapped.  
"Alex Burson, at the end, what did he say to you? I missed most of it because I was trying to keep the daughter-in-law talking downstairs in the garage while we waited for Lestrade."  
Sherlock looked down at the paper again. He looked strangely evasive. "Nothing of any interest," he replied dismissively, turning the page slowly.  
“But…ok, but what did he say?" asked John, surprised, because Sherlock didn't usually pass up any excuse to shine his brilliant deductive light in John’s general direction. Sherlock didn’t seem too keen on telling him exactly what had happened, for some strange reason. "Oh, he was very erudite - he largely just swore copiously,” replied Sherlock after a moment, in a flippant, sarcastic tone, now folding the paper back and scanning the inside front page. John waited for more but it was clear Sherlock had finished speaking.  
“Well, come on then, what did he actually _say_ to you?” John persisted.  
Sherlock looked up at John again and frowned. "He just swore, John. A lot. He just said rather a lot of four-letter words repeatedly in different orders. If you really must know, one notable point he made was that he gave me was very extensive instructions on what we could do with ourselves, in a manner of speaking.”  
John blinked. “ ‘In a manner of—?’ _Oh!_ …Oh, right, yeah, ok…Ok, got that; but can you just…can you just tell me what he actually _said_ about the case? I just need something to put for the blog. It’s just sounding so…lifeless as it is now.”  
Sherlock put the newspaper down on the table. "You want me to tell you exactly what he said? Use the actual words he used?”  
John made what could quite succinctly be described as a _‘what the fuck?’_ gesture. Wide-eyed, he jerked his head back in annoyance and made an expansive quick flare of irritation with both hands. God, Sherlock could be annoying. _“Yes,_ Sherlock!” he snapped. “Look, what—have you taken some kind of holy orders that prevent you from swearing or something?! Yeah, I can well imagine that he might’ve sworn a bit - I just want you to _tell me_ what he _said!”_ This conversation was all very high on the irritation scale. As well as already being really frustrated and pissed off, John could also now feel a tension headache starting up. However, Sherlock was oblivious to John’s irritation with him much of the time. So why should this occasion be any different?  
“Why do you need to hear it all?” he asked calmly, annoyingly, picking his newspaper up and turning to the next page, then folding it back again with a dismissive flick. “You won't be able to write any of it on the blog anyway.” 

By now John was fairly close to a minor paroxysm of frustration. He banged his hand a little on the desk. “Oh, for God’s— _Sherlock!_ How many ways can I say this? I just want to hear his explanation in his own words - so I can write about his reasoning behind why he did what he did in a more interesting way! I’m really stuck here—” and he gestured towards the patiently flashing cursor waiting on his screen, “—it sounds so boring at the moment - he must have said _something_ useful in between all the swearing that I can use in the blog!"  
Sherlock looked up at John steadily. “As I said, why do you even need to hear it? You met him, you heard how he spoke. You can guess what he would have said to me and I can assure you, you won’t be able to use any of it anyway.”  
‘Right,’ John thought. ‘I’ll bloody well _make_ him tell me.’ He was still really pissed off about the whole eye-cup-fry-up fiasco. John sat forward in his chair and deliberately let his volume control slip up a notch. _“Sherlock!_ Don’t be an idiot!” he all but bellowed, “Listen to me - _I want you to tell me_ exactly _what he said!_ Now stop being such a _cock_ about it and just bloody _tell_ me!”  
Well. That did it, all right. That was several lines well and truly crossed, right there. And other things. Sherlock continued to look back at John coldly for a long moment, the temperature dropping to below zero, then he sat back in the chair, tossed the paper aside, and spoke.  
“Alex Burson said; ’Oh, fucking hell, you fucking nosy posh _wanker!_ She was going to sign it all over to me and then you and your fucking _boyfriend_ got involved and royally fucked it _right_ up! If the trust had been in _my_ fucking name by now it would have all been completely _fucking_ above board - and what’s more, if you two pair of tits think I’m fucking going down without a fight, you’ve got another fucking think coming!…You two can fucking well go and _fuck_ yourselves!’ ” Sherlock said it all like he was reciting some lines that he had learnt for a play, with a hearty emphasis on the particular words where Alex Burson had put his own hearty emphasis. There was a split second of shocked silence and then he pushed his chair back from the table loudly in a violent movement, still staring straight at John. He stood up abruptly, then shoved the chair back in place under the table and turned and stalked over to the window. He glanced out of it for no apparent reason and then turned around into John's slightly wide-eyed, stunned and frozen silence and air that had suddenly turned rather a shocked shade of blue. Sherlock tipped his head a little to indicate that there was more to come, and then he took up the reins again, but this time, he spoke in a much calmer tone. “…I then reminded him that blackmailing his daughter-in-law to sign the trust over to him wasn't _exactly_ legal or above board," he continued, "to which he responded with some more quite eloquent curses; lots of _’fucks',‘bastards’_ and _'you two fuckers’,_ actually, and there was one word he used several times which I'm simply _not_ going to repeat, John, but I believe it has connotations with Berkeley and hunting, and then he suddenly heard you talking in the garage downstairs with his insipid daughter-in-law and he instructed me firmly to _’get my fucking boyfriend out of there'_ and that was when Lestrade arrived, and so he began to wax lyrical with various combinations of profanities and obscenities, describing the police and their numerous activities, and when Lestrade read him his rights and arrested him, he announced, 'What total utter fucking _bollocks!’_ and then he addressed the other police officers present by remarking, ‘…and you fucking useless _bastards_ can all fuck right the _fuck off!’ "_ His recital completed, Sherlock strode back to the table, yanked his chair dramatically back out from under it and sat down on it again, hard. He leant back and crossed his legs, and then his arms, watching John and waiting for him to reply. _Satisfied?_ read his expression, as clear as the copper coins in a swear jar. 

John was quite incapable of replying, just at that moment. He had heard the phrase before, 'the mind boggles' and he suddenly realised that his face must now be making a rather perfect illustration for that very phrase. The perpetrator of the crime, Alex Burson, was a coarse, gruff-voiced, sixty-six-year-old cockney; built like the proverbial small brick house and born and bred in the East End of London where he had lived all his life. He actually quite sounded like the actor Ray Winstone in character, at his most threatening, perhaps also whilst having a really bad day and maybe immediately after realising that he’d just run out of his favourite full-tar fags. He did not sound _at all_ , not in the slightest bit, like Sherlock. 

 

Sherlock was a very good mimic and a natural impressionist, and John knew full well that if Sherlock had wanted to, he could have done a very passable impression of Alex Burson’s voice, and that might have even made it all quite funny - but he _hadn’t._ Deliberately. He had simply spoken the words exactly how Alex Burson had, but in his own voice. To get John back for calling him an idiot and a cock. To shock him. And hearing Sherlock _say_ all those words and swear horribly like that in his rich, deep, cultured tones _was_ …shocking, yes, and it had certainly shocked John, but more than just shocking; to John’s ears it had been something else. It had all sounded…somehow so…deliciously… _wrong._ John had never heard Sherlock swear before - not like _that_ \- and although at the beginning of this little escapade, he had genuinely just wanted some ideas for what he could put in his blog and had been hoping for something that he could clean up and make into a good, usable and expletive-free sound bite, he was also quite tired and had a headache, was frustrated and pissed off, and Sherlock was being evasive about something John wanted to know and particularly bloody annoying full stop this morning anyway…so although, yes, he _had_ wanted to know and directly asked what Alex Burson had said, and yes, he had also known _exactly_ why Sherlock didn’t want to repeat Alex Burson's words, you could say he had pushed Sherlock to it. Mainly in retaliation for the eyes in the cup at 6 a.m.; true. So, fair enough, he had _made_ Sherlock say it all…he’d got exactly what he’d asked for. 

All the same, he still hadn't really actually expected a literal, word-for-word regurgitation quite like _that;_ five-colour effs, blinds and all.

Now, John Watson had absolutely nothing against swearing - on the contrary, he really liked a good swear. Always had done. It relieved tension, for one thing. It could sometimes be amusing. Different situations clearly called for different swear-words. He also sometimes rather liked to swear his appreciation quite enthusiastically during sex, which was naturally something that people would only know about John Watson if they’d been on particularly friendly terms with him, but hearing Sherlock say all those words… It had quite effectively done something to John that it had had no business at all doing.

And so John realised all at once that he was staring at Sherlock, that he must be a bit red in the face and also that he had the beginnings of an erection. Which was by far the most embarrassing of the three and more than just slightly mortifying. He swallowed with some difficulty, cleared his throat and fidgeted in his seat. Of course Sherlock noticed John's odd reaction. He looked at him sharply. “What?" he said, crossly.  
"Er–nothing. Nothing. N–er, nothing at all."  
"What's the matter? Is it what he said about…” Sherlock gestured delicately between them both with his hand as he spoke, “…what he said about...you and I?" He clearly meant the 'fucking boyfriend' thing.  
“No! Er, no…No. Oh God, that's–that's nothing. I'm–er, I'm used to that."  
"What, then?"  
"I–I just...erm..."John found it hard to lie on the spot. And particularly hard to lie to Sherlock, to whom lying was totally pointless. "Erm, er...nothing. It's just strange to hear you..." He decided it would be best to tell a half-truth. "It's really strange hearing you swear, that's all. It's—I've never heard you swear before. You _never_ swear. I didn't expect—it just sounded funny, that's all." _’Funny’_ really wasn't the word for it. His headache may have completely vanished but John was quite far from laughter. _Well, isn’t this awkward?_ he thought with a deepening horror. He cleared his throat again somewhat desperately. Sherlock frowned and looked at him carefully and John cringed with embarrassment under the sharp scrutiny of his gaze.  
“But that's not true,” Sherlock observed, “You know I occasionally have done, in the past.”  
John returned his look, but with difficulty. “Only if you're directly quoting someone else. Like when I first met you and you said people normally tell you to piss off. Generally, you _never_ swear. I've never heard you say...words like that....the f-word. Not like you meant it.”

There was a significant-sounding silence. “You did say ‘exactly’ - you did ask me to tell you exactly what he said…what did you expect?” Sherlock asked, slowly. “And why _did_ you even want me to tell you exactly what he said anyway? I had already told you he basically just swore a lot. You’d met him, you knew what he was like, you could have guessed _exactly_ what he said.”  
"I think I just–I just wanted to...I just..." John took a deep breath and confessed. “Oh, I was annoyed with you and you were being annoying. I just wanted to make you tell me - mostly because you seemed so reluctant to do it. I _did_ want to know for the blog, but I wanted to get you back and I thought I’d do it by making you have to say something you didn’t want to,” John replied helplessly.  
Sherlock knew there was something John was hiding under something here and he was trying to find it. "Why?" he persisted calmly.  
“Oh, I just did!” John snapped. “Just that - to get you back. Because I knew you didn’t want to tell me and you were being a such a dick about it. I wanted to make you swear in retaliation. _Ok?” Oh yeah, and that sounds really mature!_ he thought. This was getting worse. John felt like he had been very childish about forcing Sherlock into a corner, and now he was paying the price of his tit-for-tat. Now Sherlock knew something else was up with him but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. 

Yet. And John knew it wouldn't take him long. 

Sherlock fixed his gaze on John and narrowed his eyes, canting his head away whilst keeping his eyes still. The effect was very disconcerting. _Oh, here we go,_ thought John.  
“But you liked hearing me say it all, didn't you?" Sherlock said suddenly, terrifyingly very close to the truth. There were two quite different ways of understanding the meaning of the word _’like’_ in that context.  
John made a short, high pitched wavering noise in his throat, much like one a small rodent might make when trapped in a corner by an as-yet-undecided cat; a cat whose tail had just started to flick back and forth while it made up its mind. Sherlock would know instantly if John was lying. “Ummm-ah, yeah. Yeah, I did...I did. Yeah.”

There was another long, charged and very significantly quiet silence. John looked back at Sherlock, now looking less like a rodent and more like a slightly defiant rabbit caught in headlights, and Sherlock looked back at him with his _‘Hmmm, interesting’_ detached-psycho-analyst expression on, and then he leaned forward and put his elbows on the table and steepled his thumbs and fingers under his nose and chin and stared at John with narrowed eyes and suddenly his eyes widened and John could see his _“Oh!”_ expression bubbling up under the surface as Sherlock began to realise _exactly_ in which way they were understanding the world _’like’_ here. _Oh God, no,_ thought John, _oh no. This is going to be absolutely hideous. This is going to be a disaster._ To deflect it, he launched into an immediate defensive attack. He flung his hand up in the air and banged it back on the desk dramatically, as a distraction. “Oh, _look!_ Just because you're like a _machine_ who doesn't ever feel _anything!_ Forgive me, Sherlock, for… _liking_ …something…a bit… _embarrassing_ about you!"  
"I'm not a machine," said Sherlock defensively, dropping the steeple immediately and sitting upright with a frown. And hang on, was he imagining it or were Sherlock’s cheeks just a little bit pink? But he was off now, in full rant, and couldn't stop to think about that. _“Yes-you-are!”_ he continued fiercely, pointing at Sherlock, “You’re like a machine - you never feel anything about anything! All you do is…deduce stuff about people!" John was well aware he sounded like a total idiot, but he was embarrassed, and he was angry at being made to feel that way.  
"I'm _not_ a machine," said Sherlock, again, more defiantly.  
“Well go on then, if you're not a machine - tell _me_ something!" John demanded. "Tell me…something… _embarrassing_ that you like about me - if you're _so_ not a machine!"  
Now John sat back and crossed his arms, and waited for proof of Sherlock's humanity. 

After a moment, where they eyed each other on the edge of a precipice, Sherlock said in a confessional tone, “I happen to quite like it when you tell me what to do."  
That was so unexpected that John was momentarily rendered completely speechless.  
“…You _quite like it_ when I tell you _what to do…?”_ he repeated blankly, when he’d recovered, still a little wide-eyed. John felt the axis of the world shifting under his feet. It was a good thing he was sitting down or he would have had to lean against something.  
Sherlock continued. Now John saw his cheeks were _definitely_ a bit pink. "No one tells me what to do, John, or if they try to, I don't notice because I ignore them. But when you tell me what to do...it makes me…want to do it."  
John felt a wave of hot, astonished delight wash over him. So, ok, then; apparently he had the secret ability to make Sherlock Holmes _do what he told him to._

It was like suddenly being bestowed with a super-human power. For a few seconds, neither one of them moved or spoke. 

“Erm...can I…tell you what to do now?" John asked, in a slightly strangled voice. Sherlock shrugged and gestured expansively with open palms. “I don’t know,” he said mildly. “Why don’t you try me?’

Invitations like that really didn’t come along every day. What else could John do? 

He accepted it.

"Say _’fuck’_ again,” he said, looking straight at Sherlock.

Sherlock obeyed instantly. And with great relish. He elongated the 'f' sound to draw the word out from its single syllable status, and drawled the last three letters into a low-sounding, rumbling growl with the harsh kick of the 'k' at the end. He pronounced the word like it was the name of a rare Anglo-Saxon delicacy, being placed with great ceremony on a feast table before a king.

 _"Fuck,"_ he growled meaningfully, looking John straight in the eye. He said it very slowly and he used every bit of his face to say it.

 

It was like that playground game where you dared your friend to say the worst word they knew, but this was an adult version, and John was certainly experiencing a very adult response. _“MhhhmmmmohmyGod,”_ whimpered John vaguely, looking down and rubbing his forehead, so much more than just slightly flustered now. His erection had begun to make itself very undeniably known. He shifted in his seat again and took a short, sharp breath. "There's something going on here with us right now and I don't quite know how to handle it," John admitted.  
“Oh, do you not? That’s unusual. You usually do," observed Sherlock drily, who, apart from the pink cheeks, was seemingly completely calm and unaffected.  
"What should I do?" asked John.  
"Handle it?" offered Sherlock, placidly, not moving.  
"Erm. Right." John didn't move either. “How, exactly?”  
Then Sherlock leaned forward and said clearly in a low voice, "Tell me what to _do,_ John."

Oh holy _God,_ that was _hot._

John thought about telling people what to do and when he had most had the opportunity of doing so. Suddenly he knew _exactly_ how to handle it. 

John sat up, very upright indeed, shoulders back, expression firm, and - erection or not - he fixed Sherlock with a steely dark-blue gaze. He adopted the voice that his non-army friends used to jokingly refer to as his ‘Captain Watson’ voice. “Ok, Sherlock,” he said briskly, “I think it’s high time I had some words with you, in a manner of speaking…and those words are going to be upstairs in my bedroom…” He kept his face completely straight, but allowed the humour to show in his eyes. “…Several words, in fact…quite possibly on, or even in, my bed…” He kept his eyes on Sherlock but tipped his head once to clearly indicate the direction of said bedroom. “…So get yourself up there, sharpish. _Right now.”_  
Sherlock grinned wolfishly, his eyes alight and fixed on John. He reached down and adjusted himself discretely through his trousers. “Oh. Well, that certainly works for me,” he said agreeably, still grinning, and then he added, “I’ll see you up there,” and he started to get up.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry about all the prolific swearing in this one. But it is an integral part of the story, and the whole idea just sort of came to me. I couldn't stop laughing as I wrote it. What sort of person does that make me?  
> Sorry. [Insert mental picture of Sherlock’s demoniacal shark’s grin here] But not that sorry.
> 
>  
> 
> If you're not a Brit and you don’t know who Ray Winstone is, he played Regan in the British 2012 film “The Sweeney” and sounds (and maybe looks) exactly how I envisage Alex Burson. In this clip, his is the first voice you hear and he is the first person you see. (Warning for some violence later in the clip, but it’s not too graphic! No worse than what we see in Sherlock…)  
> LINK TO YOU TUBE CLIP (The Sweeney Trailer) [HERE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtoM5O0eXvE)
> 
>  
> 
> Oh, and what I said about kudos and comments in the end notes of "Something Vaguely Heart-Shaped"?...I still mean it! ;) 
> 
> There’s a favour I’d like to ask - in the real world, advertising counts. Businesses always like to ask people how they found them so they know which advertising is working. I’m intrigued to know the same thing here. I’m not on tumblr - yet - AO3 is my only online presence as a writer, and there are a lot of us on here, so I’d really like to know how you found me, if you don’t mind telling me! What I’d like to know is how did you come my way, and if it was via a search on AO3, then what keywords or tags did you search for? What drew you to me or made you read my story in particular? (Just a quick ‘few words’ answer on this question is fine! And thank you very much for letting me know!) It’s much appreciated. <3


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